FROM

Parent birds are the parents of broiler chickens,
birds who are raised for their flesh. The fertilized eggs of the broiler
breeding parent birds are removed daily from the shed and put into
incubators for hatching. They never see their offspring who are whisked away
once hatched to be ‘grown’ in huge industrial broiler production sheds for
6-8 weeks.

We found each shed filled with exhausted, debeaked and
debilitated hens suffering severe feather loss mixed together with young
virile roosters. There were no cages, all the birds were tightly packed
together on metal flooring. We saw a couple old battle scarred roosters
limping about who had obviously missed the ‘old’ rooster cull. This is
called ’spiking’ in the industry - where they kill the older male birds at
around 50 weeks of age and replace them with young roosters to further boost
the economic productivity of the already exhausted hens. Hens who are laying
the eggs which after hatching will be the future battery hens, barn-laid
hens and free range hens who lay the eggs people eat.

This night our team had planned to inspect some RSPCA approved barn-laid
egg sheds but upon arrival we discovered these sheds had been depopulated
and were awaiting the next batch of victims. We’ve been inside these same
sheds before and filmed the overcrowding, debeaking, cannibalism and
torment.

As we stood in the cold night air at midnight near these empty sheds we
could hear plaintive and eerie wailing noises followed by piercing screams
in the distance. We followed our ears and several paddocks away we found two
huge sheds both brightly lit in the middle of the night.

Each shed was
filled with exhausted, debeaked and debilitated hens suffering severe feather loss mixed together with young virile roosters. There were no cages,
all the birds were tightly packed together on metal flooring. We saw a
couple old battle scarred roosters limping about who had obviously missed
the ‘old’ rooster cull. This is called ’spiking’ in the industry - where
they kill the older male birds at around 50 weeks of age and replace them
with young roosters to further boost the economic productivity of the
already exhausted hens. Hens who are laying the eggs which after hatching
will be the future battery hens, barn-laid hens and free range hens who lay
the eggs people eat.

It was clear that the hens were being repeatedly mated with no escape,
their backs were red raw. The hens are ISA laying hens.

The shed was
extremely overcrowded, the birds had little room to move, and the thousands
upon thousands of birds had only hard metal flooring to stand on and their
claws were sore and damaged. You can see the photos we took above, but these
won’t let you hear their chilling screams and wails.

The conditions were so
appalling and distressing for these feeble birds that it reduced rescue team
members to tears. But our loyalty to these suffering animals will NEVER EVER
be reduced. We are there for them and will do whatever it takes to help
them.

You can help. Please forward this blog to your family and friends so they
know who they are eating and that there’s a better way, so we can all live
healthy and fulfilling lives!

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